Sunday, February 10, 2013

Birthday Apocalypse

This Sunday we had our tri-annual (is that even a word?) Apocalypse Game. These come up in Feb, June/July and Oct which is around the time of most of our gamer-friends' birthdays. This one in particular is dedicated to Brandon's Bday. We all pitched in and got him some models from Forgeworld. There were 30 space marines in Mark III armour along with a command upgrade with World Eaters shoulder pads and transfer sheet. We are all looking forward to seeing these baddies painted up along side his primarch.

Now, for the game: It was a 17,500 point per side, Tyranid versus Imperium battle. There were 7 players per side so we got to have 2,500 points per person. The setup was a little different from the normal Apoc rules. The board was 12' x 6'. First to set up were the two players who had a Fortress of Redemption and a Defense Line, Brandon G. and Paul. They put these on opposite long table edges and put some units next to them for defense. The Fortress was full of Dark Angels and the Defense Line was manned by a large platoon of Death Korps of Krieg along with 3 barrage tanks (names?)

For the tyranid setup, there was a totally new setup. We got a notepad and listed every unit we had and numbered them. Then we cut up small squares of paper with the numbers 1-100 on them and placed these numbers on the board. These represented some type of radar blip on the Auspexes of the Imperial forces. If a unit moved within (their initiative value) of inches, the blip was revealed to be either a blank entry, or the unit that matched the number was deployed. Also, if any blast weapons were shot at a unit, it would scare them out and they were deployed on top of the number marker. Robbie's Heirophant Bio-Titan was also deployed from the beginning as it was too big to be hiding.

I don't know if the Tyranid players had a goal, but the objective for the Imperium was to Kill all of the Synapse Creatures. I had 6 units, only the Tyranid Prime and 2 Warriors were alive at the end.

There were obviously too many armies to keep track of, so I will post my list.

My deployment was somewhat scattered. We had the Spore Chimneys Strategem which give Night Fighting rules to anything shooting within 12" of them. I deployed my Trygon and Tervigon near two of the chimneys. The termagants went near the Tervigon to benefit from the Toxing sacs. Three of the Hive guard were in a trench near the Trygon. The Tyrant went across the board in some ruins next to the Hormagaunts. The Tyranid Prime deployed in the trench in the center with the Warrior brood to give them some T5 Wounds to protect from inst-kills and boost their BS. The last 3 hive guard when in the center trenches closer to the far board edge, near the Fortress.

Rather than give a full battle report, I just wanna get down what my units did. Hopefully, once I talk to everyone again and combine info with the XenoFTW blog, a more complete picture will be painted.

My Prime and Hormies ran out of the rubble to target a unit of Chad's Salamander Sternguard who had just Drop Podded nearby. The Tyrand swooped behind the unit and fired both devourers, killing two including the powerfisted sergeant. However, the Hormies lost 3 models to an overwatch that included a heavy flamer. This resulted in being about 1/2" short of the charge range, BLAST!!!

They were hit by no less than 7 heavy flamers in the following shooting phase and wiped off the planet. The Tyrant was targeted by 2 Vulture gunships who came in right behind him. The number of wounds from Lascannon fire caused him to evade to get his Jink save. He ended up taking 2 wounds but passed his grounding test, which prevented anyone else from wanting to target him. In his next shooting phase, he used the psychic power that is 2 Str4 AP2 shots to kill a Salamander from the second drop pod that landed near the first. This kill allowed him to regain a wound. I was surprised that he his as he could only Snap Shot due to evading the lascannons. I believe he only took 1 wound in the next shooting phase from the Vultures but was killed by one of the new Dark Angels' Nephilim Fighters fielded by Brandon G. He didn't kill a whole lot, but made enough saves and soaked up some heavy firepower.

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The Tervigon pooped out 14 babies on turn one, but rolled a double to get there, NUTS! The new unit, the old unit and their Mama headed toward the Defense line to be a nuissance. First attempt at Catalyst resulted in BOX CARS, losing a wound to perils of the warp. He stayed near the Spore Chimney which helped tremendously. First shooting phase saw a few Death Korps live up to their names and die to termagant and tervigon shooting. On the following Imperial shooting phase, Ben had 5 VINDICATORS come in on the board edge near the Tervigon. They fired the 10" blast right on top of the big mama. He hit 5 and 8 gaunts in the new and old squad along with their mama. I made 4 6+ saves on the old squad and on the tervigon!!!!! This was a foreshadowing of the awesome cover saves I would be making all day. Almost the exact same thing happened in the next shooting phase and more gaunts died, but the mama made that 6+ again! These units all ended up eventually charging Andy W's two man unit of Space Wolves Cavalry with all the bells and whistles, helped by a Trygon. The tervigon giving the poison attacks helped kill one model, but they all ended up dying to either close combat or shooting in the case of the mama. Man I hate those 2+/3++ saves!

The Subterranean Assault was my favorite thing in the whole game. They came in on turn 2 right in front of the 5 Vindicators. I got some looks from the other players when I did this, but I knew what the outcome would be. The formation lets the Raveners deepstrike within 6" of the Trygon without scatter, and then get to charge on the turn they arrive. The two units charged separate vindicators, killing one and taking a hull point from another. I would have done better, but when rolling to-hit with a squad, I accidentally re-rolled the 2's as if they had 2 pair of talons instead of the Rending Claws. This resulted in only a glancing hit. The trygon was charged by the Space Wolf Calvary and did a couple of wounds before dying in the last round. I wish I would have done the smash attack or whatever doubles your strength, that T5 is not too fun, even at Str6. Both unit of Raveners moved into the Space wolf combat by the end, once all the Vindicators were dead. I don't know if that lord ever did die, but he was close at the least.....

The Trygon who deployed on the table enjoyed the cover saves from the spore chimney the first turn it was shot at. I believe I made 2 out of 3 of the 6+ saves. Then he charged into some of the Vindicators and killed 1 in each of 2 rounds. He was then the target of shooting by 5 Dreads for 2 turns. The Vindicators (dead or alive) were all the cover he needed to get a 5+ cover save. This, combined with the worst rolling I have ever seen 2 people do, failed to put a wound on him until they reached him in Melee by crawling over destroyed Vindicators. He eventually died to a Dread but not before taking out the first one to reach him.

The first set of 3 Hive guard shot at any vehicle they could reach, but lost 2 in the second turn. The last bug kept pulling hull points off of other tanks. The other set of Hive guard managed to kill a Storm Talon, owned by Bill and his Crimson fists. I actually had one die roll a 6 to hit (snap shot), a 6 to penetrate, and a 6 resulting in an explosion. I was expecting a 6" explosion, but I'll still take it. These guys also killed 2 landspeeders and took a point off Brandon A's Thunderhawk.

My Warriors with Prime got off one round of shooting, I believe at more Space Wolf cavalry, one of whom had the Legion Relic strategem. I believe I did 8 wounds, but he only failed 1 save. They were promptly assaulted by some Salamander Dread and caught up in close combat for the rest of the game. At the time, it seemed that they were getting tar-pitted by the Dread. I guess in hindsight, they were doing the tar-pitting, keeping the Dread from moving on and killing other guys.

Last, the genestealers came out of a tunnel near the front right of the board, on turn 3. They charged a couple of dirty Death Korps tanks and blew up both, killing 10 of them in the process. Whoops!!!! They then took more love from some heavy flamers. They were almost to their next combat when the game ended.